She doesn't have a leg to stand on.

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Very familiar expression that most people learn early in life.

Would you have any trouble with this one?

I do have some trouble with idioms and some proverbs, but am not sure if I ever had trouble interpreting this one.

As far as this goes, do you understand the expressions that you've already learned(been exposed to)? Or just understand how they're USED, even when you don't understand the meaning of them?

Last edited by EXPECIALLY on 03 Dec 2011, 6:45 pm, edited 1 time in total.

If I've learned an idiom, I'm more likely to recognize it as an idiom, but I still tend to take most things literally.

That one I can get, because it visually makes sense to me...I automatically see a person wobbling on one leg and equate it to a shaky argument. I really don't get, "he just shot his foot off", though. I get what it's supposed to mean, but can't see at all why it was used originally.

If I've learned an idiom, I understand the speaker's intent right away,
but get distracted by the literal meaning and have a hard time making the literal meaning go away.

If I haven't heard the idiom, really if what the person says sounds completely insane to me, I tell the "I don't know what means [fill in suspected idiom here]" I had to learn to do that (to ask for clarity repeatedly) because when I was learning idioms, sometimes I would absorb some person's quirks, believing them to be mass-accepted idiom.

My mum used to tell me to "change the record" to which (initially for a while) I would reply "What record, there isn't a record playing". However I soon learned it meant to change the subject (as I was rattling on too much about something lol).

I understand most idioms. I do have to find the meaning for new ones by asking or looking it up, but I usually get the ones that I already know. In some cases I know what they mean, in others, I know how and when to use them but can't always put the exact meaning into words.

I get both the not so literal meaning and the literal one in my head at the time though.

I don't know what that idiom means.

Sometimes when an idiom is used in a sentence, I can understand what it means because it makes sense. Lot of times I get confused because I have no idea what something means. I can tell it's an idiom because it doesn't make sense what the person is talking about.

I can understand what an expression means after learning it and I can learn how an expression is learned and then I try and figure out what it may mean based on how it's used. But I am not always right because I once thought telling someone to get off their high horse is something you say when someone says something you don't like or don't agree with. But my husband told me it means you have too high of standards.

I still get literal images in my head and still know what they mean.

With most idioms, I get a literal (and visual) interpretation, and then I can find the non-literal meaning.

Don't you mean "shot himself in the foot?" I mean, I guess it's the same thing, but i've never heard it the way you typed it. Anyway, it just means they screwed up and made things worse for themselves. Nobody intentionally shoots himself in the foot, and it would definitely make things worse for the person if he did that.

If I have encountered an idiom before and reasoned out it's meaning, I store that information for later. When I come across a new idiom, if I can rationalize the meaning/origin, then it doesn't present too overwhelming a problem.

For example; 'S/he doesn't have a leg to stand on.'
The 'leg' represents the facts on which someone is basing an argument.
'S/he' refers to the argument itself.

So 'S/he doesn't have a leg to stand on.' becomes 'The argument doesn't have facts to stand on.' becomes 'There are no facts to support the argument.'

It would be easier if no idioms were used in the conversation, as I wouldn't have to reason through them, possibly missing some of the conversation.

(By 'conversation' I'm reffering to an intelluctual discussion, not a social/casual conversation.)

That's what causes our "esprit de l'escalier" I guess. If we process what has been said after the conversation has ended, witty comebacks won't be there when we need them..... I could tell someone "you don't have a leg to stand on" but my mind goes straight to "what? that's not true!!" and that's even an improvement from 20 year old me who would have answered: "really? " and thought it over, thinking the person did have facts but wasn't sharing them, and I was in the wrong. I bet I'll be able to shoot idioms at people at 40 years old. Fingers crossed.....

Imagine a wild west shootout, and someone messes up trying to draw their gun so that it goes off while it is still in the holster. He is very likely to have somewhat literally "shot his foot off" or "shot himself in the foot"

I wonder, these days, how many people would simply get hung up wondering what a record is...

When I encounter a metaphor like that I ask for its meaning which usually explains how a phrase came to be. Knowing how the imagery came to be, I'll simply keep phrase and meaning in mind.

If someone learns about phrase's meaning, accepts its social merit and memorises it he or she should be just fine with figurative language unless he or she has other impairments that (indirectly) interfere with their language abilities.

Many words we use aren't any different from that. Abstract concepts even such as general words for categories have multiple meanings determined by culture/people. "It's raining cats and dogs" is just taking it a little further than single words such as "trees", "animals" or short sentences such as "I'm sad" or "he just lost". None of these words talk about one object someone experiences. Understanding of idioms and such is not a different ability altogether or anything.

With that said - all of that can be real difficult. The level of difficulty appears to be different from person to person.

Personally, I think sayings and metaphors are far easier to understand and to use than everyday concepts such as "happiness" are because there are far fewer universal/impersonal meanings to "it's raining cats and dogs" than there are personal interpretation to "I lost to someone else" or "I was excited".

everything can be broken down to nonsense if it is thought about in a straight forward way (non laterally)

if a person is wobbling on one leg (eg "hopping"), then they must still have that one leg to "wobble" about on. if someone has NO leg to stand on, they can not stand at all. they must sit.

i do not stand on my legs. i stand "with" my legs. i define "standing on" as what the soles of my feet press upon (due to gravity). my legs support me to stand on what i stand upon. it is impossible for me to stand on my legs, because my legs are not beneath the soles of my feet.

i do understand what it means, but i could never have worked it out if i was not told.

the idea of shooting ones foot off is reasonably simple. it means similar to "going off half cocked".
it means to me that someone is so sure they are going to be victorious, that they pull the trigger before they even extract their "gun" from their holster, and therefor shoot their own foot.

my father used to tell me i sounded like a broken record. ( i was young and unlearned at that time (like 9 years old)).

what does a broken record sound like?. obviously it could not be played on a turntable because the stylus would jump around and be damaged, and it would probably be thrown off the platter if it was tried to be played.

how broken? if it was shattered into many pieces, then it could not even be played for the smallest time.
so what does that sound like? i know it does not sound like me.

later i was told that it means i repeat myself over and over in the same fashion (if i am not understood)

there is only one groove in any plastic record, and that groove is continuous. sometimes, damage to a part of the groove results in the stylus slipping back into the previous rotation, and therefore the sound goes into a infinitely repeating cycle.
but the record is not broken. it is just damaged. a broken record would result in the stylus being flung up and landing randomly elsewhere as it fell (word salad).


ok i have said enough. i have new brake pads.
screech.